It was dark. There was the impression of giant things moving around them, kicking up eddies in the air, but making no sound. There was a cold in the air, too. A cold they could feel in their bones, but not one that came from all around. It radiated from some point ahead of them, where the darkness seemed somehow thicker, as if that were possible. They could each hear the breath of the other, and their own, but no word nor shout nor scream could they force past their lips. Their hands tightened their grip on each other, but with a sickening lurch that grip was torn away, and they were alone in the darkness.

Back outside dawn was breaking, and Rebbecca made her way down to the edge of the city to watch. Down by the low perimeter wall, out of the maze of streets, the air was brisk. Rebbecca was used to the sweltering temperatures of the engine room, and she shivered slightly, not entirely without pleasure, as she leaned on the wall and watch the sun burst over the clouds.

Here above the clouds there was no weather. Days were always sunny, nights were always clear. Only the wind changed, but it seemed that the city had been designed with that in mind. The streets were short, and rarely straight, so as to baffle the air and keep it from howling unchecked amongst the populace. The city itself sloped upwards from the edge, the staggered rooftops dotted liberally with windmills wheeling in the breeze, using the energy to grind grain or to pump water, or storing it in giant flywheels and steam batteries.

Rebbecca stood for a time with her eyes closed, feeling the warmth of the sun and the cool of the breeze on her face. After a few minutes she opened her eyes and started walking again, this time towards the airship docks. Hart’s workshop would be open by now, and that was her first stop.

Rebbecca woke before the dawn, and breakfasted heartily. As she did every morning she made her way down the street to the engine room in the cool pre-dawn light and walked and walked amongst her charges. Everything was normal as she checked pressure gauges and nodded to the skeleton crew working out the end of the night shift. Satisfied, she went looking for the night foreman.

“Miss Pannicot,” Robert straightened up as she approached, “Sarah tells me things didn’t go so well with the council.”
“About as well as I should have expected, really,” she gave a small smile. “There is a meeting called for tomorrow, do you mind working these hours for another day?”
“Not at all, Miss. Sarah and I have already arranged it.”
“Thankyou, Robert. I’ll make it up to you two, or see that the council does.”
“It’s not like I have a wife or kids to get back to. Besides, you’re always here twice as long as we are.”
“Ah yes, well I don’t have a wife either,” she laughed. “I’m not sure how long my errands today will take, but I’ll stop by a couple of times if I can.”
“There’s no need, everything should be smooth sailing. There’s not even any maintenance planned for a couple of weeks.”
“I know. I’m on edge with this whole situation is all, just indulge me.”

The snowfall was light at first, settling on leaves and branches and making its way through to the ground in the occasional wisp to melt away quickly on the dirt or leaf litter. We walked for miles that afternoon, faces apple-red and breath hanging in the air between us. We walked not to get anywhere, but in the thrill of exploration. We shared the secret spaces inside fallen logs and beneath the undergrowth.

By the time the sun neared the horizon the snow was heavy enough to push through to the forest floor, and we had both been caught under drifts shed from branches high above. We crunched softly back to the cabin, where the banked coals kept the edge of the cold at bay. We stripped of our wet clothes and lay them on the hearth to dry, then set about building a fire.

The weather, whilst for the most part extremely pleasant, was prone to occasional unexpected extremes of heat or cold or sleet or wind. The response of the denizens had been to build the entire thing indoors. There were courtyards and cloisters open to the air scattered liberally throughout the city, with grass and trees and pools and fountains, but everything else was indoors: streets and alleys and town squares and footpaths, all under the one stretching, arching, undulating roof.

Kat lay on her back amongst the stacks, watching the rain spatter in small drops against the large skylights. When the drops got large enough they would cascade down the gentle curve, pulling others in as they went sliding down into the catchments and away out of sight. Whenever it rained she tried to find somewhere to watch; if she didn’t think she’d be missed, sometimes she even headed for the nearest courtyard and just stood there as the sky emptied over her.

The city stretched for miles and miles in every direction, and Kat had lived inside its walls and under its roof her entire life, never once venturing outside its confines. At times like this, though, she fantasized about scrambling up and out onto the wide open expanse of the rooftop and running free.

Joshua got a job driving one of those scooters with the signs on the back.

It seemed more productive than quietly raging about them.

It wasn’t a case of “If you can’t beat ’em, join ’em”, though, he figured that he was doing some good. Rather than using it to contribute to air pollution, noise pollution, visual pollution and traffic, he would drive to a nearby park, throw a tarp over the sign and sit under a tree for a few hours. Then it was just a matter of winding the odometer forward, siphoning the petrol and dropping the scooter back at the depot.

He wasn’t particularly concerned about taking money under false pretenses from people who couldn’t be bothered even researching their target demographic when they could just throw cash at the problem instead.

For nine years his name had been growing in infamy. For the last five almost every soul on the planet had known who he was, and almost all of them feared him. It had been bank robberies at first, but soon that wasn’t enough. He needed more than he could buy with money.

Now the world was at his feet, but the world didn’t know why. People thought that the slaughter and the iron fist were the means, and that power was the end. Power was the means. Not a single person still alive knew his origin story. They wouldn’t feel differently if they knew. Maybe a little pity, but he didn’t want that. Besides, they shouldn’t feel differently. It didn’t matter. The time machine was almost ready. Soon.

Falling Blossom walked through her front door and into the living room of her apartment. She didn’t turn any of the ceiling light on; didn’t even take off her shades, though they did adjust to pick out the edges of the room and the couch in a ghostly white. The storage bot zipped out of the wall and scooped up her boots as she shucked them off, whisking them away until they were next needed.

For a long time she stood, resting her forehead on the cool glass of the window that was her eastern wall, looking down at the lights of the strip reflected in the water. Eventually she sighed and pulled herself away from the view. She swiped a panel on the wall and the room began to reconfigure itself, the couch sinking into the floor and the bed rising up against the other wall. While she waited for it to be done she stripped, dropping everything on the floor for the storage bot except for a hand knife, which she tucked under her pillow. A few more taps on the panel called up her favourite sleep settings: dim points to simulate stars on the ceiling light, and a slight tint on the window to cut down the glare of the neon glow from the strip, deepening to full blackout by dawn.

Sarah had played in the forest since she was a child. There was a clearing with a waterfall that was her favourite place. She had spent many afternoons swimming in the spray or lazing on the sun-warmed rocks. The route to the clearing was different every time, but that had never seemed strange to her. Her feet always knew the way.

There were many animals in the forest, but she had never seen another human being under the trees. She felt a kinship with the animals. Sometimes a small deer would cross her path, or a fox, or a badger, and a look of recognition would pass between them. The Forest King watched.

The forest comes right up to the city wall to the south. People have tried to cut it back over the years, but no headway is ever made. No-one has ever seen them change, but the paths between the trunks and under the leaves never seem the same twice. Every year a few people go in and disappear. Some show up again weeks later, some never at all.

Thirty years ago, someone tried to burn back the trees. The flames cleared the undergrowth and the forest thrived, but the buildings caught fire and nearly a quarter of the city was damaged.

It is said that the Forest King stood beneath the boughs and watched.